Many smokers use indirect heat and smoke to cure food. Indirect heat smokers require the smoking chamber to be opened to replenish the smoking material. The disadvantage to this design is that every time the smoker is opened, the temperature drops in proportion with the time the smokers is open, and this increases the time needed to smoke the food due to the temperature loss. Smokers that do not require opening the smoking chamber but have another method for replenishing the smoking materials usually require the opening of a door which still results in heat loss though to a lesser extent than those that require opening the smoking chamber. Current smoker designs allow airflow for the smoking process but do nothing to control and utilize the airflow to affect the smoking process. The smokers that utilize ports for air intake typically do not protect the ports from falling debris and this debris may block and clog the ports thus leading to uneven air flow and uneven cooking.
The different smoker designs described above have significant disadvantages such as uneven cooking, time consuming operation and ultimately inefficient operation.